For the past two weeks my CT has been reading “Where the Red Fern Grows” by Wilson Rawls. He reads 10 minutes a day out loud to them after lunch every day and then asks the students questions at the end to test their comprehension. After reading the article “Book Talk: Continuing to Rouse Minds and Heart to Life” by Triplett and Buchanan, I have realized this would be an excellent time to do a book talk; even it if was just once or twice a week. At first I thought the students were not paying attention to the story while it was being read because many of them were fidgeting or staring out the window. After reading this article I realize that asking those questions after the book is being read is not a very good assessment tool. The students in this classroom all have learning disabilities and many of them have trouble with comprehension, a book talk would be an excellent way for them to share some personal connections to the book while summarizing what has happened in the section the teacher just read.
There is a very diverse range of students in my classroom. There are only 9 students in the entire class and a couple love to share insight and shout out answers all the time, a couple are very shy and do not talk unless they are called upon, and the rest of the students are somewhere in between. The students who are shy need more scaffolding than the students who love to talk. They need more direction and often will not perform tasks or assignments until they are told step by step the exact directions. My hope is that for a response centered talk to take place that the students who talk a lot and always have great insight will motivate and inspire the students who do not talk as often. When other people tell stories it often brings back similar memorizes that you have. This is my hope for any group talk with these students. I know that the students who are on the shyer side have many stories to tell and would have great insight also; they just need to know that they are safe to express their feelings.
An example of this is when the students were writing their own personal narratives. They were a little stuck so my CT decided to write his own narrative. He wrote a short story on the overhead projector with the students and also drew pictures. It was a very personal story about his alcoholic dad who he has only met a couple times. Giving the students this story as an example sparked many memories in their heads and many of them came up with their own ideas for a story that same day. I really liked this form of scaffolding because he did not give the students a specific thing to write about, he simple wrote about his own life which sparked memories for the students.
3 comments:
One thing you might think about with this particular group of kids is if they know how to attend to a story they are listening to and comprehend along the way. As teachers, we tend to read for a chunk of time and then discuss at the end. We do this for several reasons such as not wanting to interrupt the flow of the story, wanting to save time, wanting to push kids summarization skills, etc. As readers ourselves, we are asking and answering comprehension questions as we read, not waiting to the end. One of the things that kids often don't understand is that the reason we ask questions is not only to assess, but more importantly to model for them the types of questions they should be asking themselves as they read or listen. Sometimes it is easier to get them to understand that if you model during the reading what questions you are asking yourself and why.
Hey Tina!
It sounds like a book talk would be a wonderful idea for your CT’s classroom. This would be good, especially since there are many students in your class with learning disabilities. Students with disabilities all learn differently and it may help them gain a stronger connection with the book, “Where the Red Fern Grows.” Some students may have a hard time creating images in their heads of the words that are being read aloud to them by the teacher. A book talk discussion could aid them. This will also help them feel more comfortable over time in their classroom environment. This could eventually help some of the shyer and less social students in the classroom by allowing them to feel more relaxed to share their thoughts and ideas about the book.
Hey Tina,
It was interesting to her about how LA is handeled in a special needs classroom. Your entry made me very curious and eager to learn about the advantages of book talks in special needs classrooms! I wonder if there needs to be more student to student interaction during language arts lessons in order for the students to learn from each other. I agree with you when you say that the students would benefit from a response centered discussion by being able to reflect on other's ideas. I beleive that if they were able to explore and share their ideas, this would make the text more meaningful to them. In order to get the shy students to participate maybe your CT (or you) could split them up into groups before the book talk so the students can share their ideas with just one other person first. This may help them feel more comfortable with their ideas. Also, some students may need extra time in order to formulate their ideas. "Group talk" before "book talk" might allow them some time to organize thier thoughts so that they are prepared to participate.:)
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